Surprising stat: Thunder pass the ball less than every other NBA team

As the Thunder head into tonight’s matchup with the Hornets looking to get themselves back to the .500 mark, we’ve obviously spent a fair amount of time over the past few weeks dissecting the team and what they’ve done wrong.

Jon Hamm, one of our favorite scribes, mentioned an interesting bit of information related to the Thunder and their propensity (or lack thereof) to move the basketball.

The Thunder are last in the league in passes made and received per game.

That's supposedly a bad thing. And maybe it is to some degree. However…

the 19-4 Houston Rockets are 29th in the league in those categories too.

It’s interesting to note that the Rockets and Thunder are the teams that pass the ball the fewest amount of times, as the Rockets are probably the season’s biggest overachiever to this point, while the Thunder are the opposite.

We hear the old adage that it’s a “make or miss” league all the time, so I guess this tidbit of information serves as a reminder of such. The Rockets are considered an offensive juggernaut and have James Harden, who’s probably the most unstoppable guard in the league right now. The Thunder, well, let’s just say that their shot selection and shooting percentages, across the board, aren’t pretty.

For what it’s worth, as a team, the Thunder average 20.8 assists per game, which ranks them 25th in the league. By every imaginable metric, we’re seeing that they’re not exactly a cohesive bunch on the offensive end.

Clearly, there’s still work to be done.

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